Shading Secrets
by NessieGG
Summary: Sometimes he's sure that she hates him. [IchiRuki. One shot.]


_Author's Notes: Wow, I can't believe I forgot to post this here. This was written for the IchiRuki LiveJournal Community's fall fanworks contest. I didn't win, but I had fun writing the piece so all is well. _

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach and am making no profit from this fan fiction.

**Shading Secrets**

By Nessie

Sometimes he's sure that she hates him. Not seriously and not for long, but he gets the feelings she tries to understand him – the way he is – and when she fails, she directs the frustration at him. That is Rukia's logic. And for a long time, Ichigo lets it go because _he_ gets _her_. She can brood, she can ignore him, but by tomorrow morning she'll be right back to drawing weird pictures and asking him to poke the straw into her juice box.

It's not so bad at school. In fact, Ichigo is fairly certain she truly likes him in the classroom. That or she does a good job or pretending so. If she doesn't like him then it's damn strange for her to guide him to the roof during lunch so they can get their hands all over each other.

The thing is, Ichigo understands something Rukia doesn't. He knows why she hates him, if intermittently. He can look in her eyes and see puddles of fury in a hundred shades of blue. He can feel her impatience rake along his spine as though she'd sliced him open with her zanpakuto; and it hurts like hell, but he can't find it in himself to blame her.

After all, _he's_ the one who keeps secrets. Secrets that _stay_ kept until…

* * *

"GOD DAMN IT!"

Rukia jerks her head sharply to stare it him. Her small hand has what he's sure is a death-hold on Sode no Shirayuki. "You know," she tells him with a sort of calmness that cleverly disguises the worry that currently furrows her face, "swearing isn't going to improve your aim."

With a narrow-eyed glance at her, Ichigo readjusts his grip on Zangetsu's hilt and focuses on the huge Hollow that grins down and him using teeth smeared with his blood. As it drips down from the boy's injured shoulder and sticks between his fingers, Ichigo thinks hard. It had been the first lucky shot a Hollow had gotten in on him in a long time.

He is sure that it will be even longer before it happens again. With a smirk, he replied to Rukia's flippant remark, "It improves my mood." He catches her disapproving frown as he runs ahead. Before she can shout out a protest, he calls back to her. "Just stay here, Rukia! I'll take care of it!"

The Hollow sees him coming and lunges at the same instant that he does. Blood sprays through the air like a crimson baptism, emphasized by a swift rainfall, cold as ice. Spots of red and water shower Rukia, who stands below with wide eyes and hands that shakily reach for him.

"Ichigo!"

There is a long line of scarlet running down the center of the Hollow's mask – Ichigo has cut it in two. Curses spout from the wayward soul, but Ichigo ignores them and walks away, not waiting to see him disappear into another world with so many sparkling lights. Rain dampens his hair and runs off the hard line of his jaw.

Rukia follows and neither of them speaks before they arrive at home and they are clean of any battle stains. They change, he into plain black fleece pants and dark blue sleeveless shirt, she into the plain white cotton nightgown her bought for her over the summer when it was hot in the night. (Why she insisted on wearing it during the cool October nights was a question he didn't have the slightest clue to answer with.) In the comforting familiarity of his own room, Ichigo collapses onto his bed and is only mildly surprised when Rukia joins him. She usually needs several minutes to reflect on the fight, but apparently it is not such a case this evening. She straddles his waist and lowers her forehead to his chest. The fall of her dark hair obscures her face from his view.

Automatically, his hands come up to hold her. Despite all essence of the Hollow having vanished with it, Ichigo can still faintly smell the scent of sour blood. He starts upon realizing that she is trembling. For a moment, he freezes, thinking. It has been quite a while since she last shook so in his arms. That last time was when…

"_I told you not to follow me!"_

A long time ago, he mentally concluded.

"Why do you always say that?" Her voice is low and muffled against the fabric of his shirt, as if she's speaking from a much farther distance than right below his neck.

He blinks, obviously failing to comprehend the meaning of her question. Why she would be so upset after doing something as routine as exterminating a Hollow, he has no idea. "What?" His voice is rougher than he intends it to be, and her head shoots up, the heels of her tiny hands digging into his ribs.

Her eyes are cool embers, and he can't decide if she's chilling or burning him with her gaze. " 'Stay here, Rukia!' " Her face is contorted with discontent, and she holds a tone that he has never before heard from her – mockery, icy and hard. " 'I'll take care of it, Rukia.' "

Ichigo stares, uncertain of how to respond to the blatant, coldly-executed impression of him. His hands have tightened on her and, realizing it, he hurries to loosen up. Rukia's hands bunch, and he can feel all ten of her knuckles leaving imprints on his stomach.

"Just like that." Backing up, she half-rolls, half-jumps off of him and looks down into his eyes with more ferocity than any he had dreamed of ever being worn by this woman who had made him a Shinigami. He props himself up on an elbow to see her better. "I'm small, but I'm not weak, Ichigo. Stop treating me like I'm made of fucking _glass_!"

Outside, the rain intensifies and it beats against his window pane, running down the glass she says he thinks of her as like tears on a transparent face.

He feels it when his mouth opens, but his throat is dry and renders him unable to respond. In contrast, his mind is surprisingly sharp in response to her unanticipated outburst. He has expected it, Ichigo thinks. He's been expecting it for a while now. Ever since she came back.

Rukia only seems to grow angrier with him every silent second that passes. Pink temper colors her cheeks and her hands are clenched into tiny fists. The sight is almost comical – except that it pains him more than punches to the gut to see her so upset. "Don't you have _anything _to say?"

Her shoulders don't stop shaking. God, why won't she stop shaking?

He isn't ready. Even though the signs of impending confrontation have been coming for months, and even though he's been reminding himself that there is only much he should force her to take, he had thought there would be more time to figure things out. Ichigo doesn't know how to communicate to her everything she wants – _needs _– to know. And lately her eyes have been less and less pools of comfort rather than razor-sharp discs of accusation. He isn't afraid of Rukia, but he worries about the reaction he'll get once she knows…

Knows what?

She turns away and distracts him with the movement. The shaking hasn't stopped, and he wants to reach out and grab her, drag her against him, and hold her still until she's as still and calm as he is pretending to be. The line of her back is rigid and her skin looks the least inviting it ever has even beneath the thin straps of her nightgown. He's certain that if he were to touch her right now, she would be colder than the steel of his sword.

Her voice, when it comes, is biting. "When I was alive, it was difficult to find a man who didn't have something to say every moment of the day."

A nerve is struck, and Ichigo's eyes darken. "Rukia—"

"And of course _now_ you want to talk." She gives him a look that reads quite clearly: _Predictable._

"_Rukia_!" He leaps from the bed.

Thunder claps outside. The power falters, and his desk lamp zips out, plunging both of them into autumn darkness. There is no light for several tense moments, only the sound of hard, labored breathing. Lightning fills the sky outside and briefly illuminates his bedroom, showing a mess of intertwined legs and linked fingers. A neighborhood generator activates somewhere and a streetlight snaps on, casting a long, golden-orange stripe over the carpet, encountering Ichigo's knees and Rukia's ankle but failing to reach any further. There are two pairs of eyes glinting in the black, both intense and staring into the other one, hoping for something…anything…else to happen.

Her breathing comes erratically, her chest pressing against his with a gentle rhythm. He can feel the rapid pace at which her heart is rushing and revels in it. She is wild with surprise, frustration, and building excitement that she may or may not want to feel right now. Her eyes are polished gems in this shadow that is containing them, and they watch him with a fervor that has his blood heating although he doesn't know the cause. Mostly he suspects it is confusion that's getting him heated up.

How the hell, Ichigo wonders as his hand tightens around hers, can she do so much to him and talk about herself as being alive before? "Rukia." He whispers her name and her eyes soften the slightest bit at the sound of it. "You're alive _now_."

She ends up hurting him despite all his efforts to keep her from doing so. She cuts him with the tears that fill her eyes. "Then why," she begins, but she has to stop and swallow the lump in her throat. After a shaky inhalation, she goes on. "Why don't you trust me to protect you anymore?"

He hesitates and has to double his grip on her when she attempts to pull away. He presses his forehead to hers and closes his eyes. "Because it's not about me. You don't protect _yourself_."

Rukia studies him. He wants to squirm under such serious scrutiny but holds still. "That doesn't tell me much," she insists bitterly.

Ichigo slides his arms beneath her small form and presses her to him. Talking…it isn't one of his strongest suits, but she's right. She's been right for so long and he tries and tries to keep on avoiding her, but he understands this much; either he gives into her demands and opens up, or he'll lose her.

And while the first is going to be agonizing and difficult, he suspects that it can't be as bad as the second would be.

He sighs and feels her relax – not in triumph, but in preparation. "You weren't me," he begins. When she shoots him a puzzled expression, he restarts. "You don't know what it was like for me. To watch you go and just…disappear into this place I'd only kind of believed in. Soul Society." He angles a semi-miffed look down at her. "You made it sound like such a great place, but I didn't have any picnic there."

Her mouth threatens to smile, but Rukia fights it in favor of a more solemn set of her jaw. "I told you not to come."

"That's just it. You were crying—"

_Crying._

"—and walking off and all I could do was fucking lie there while that dipshit Renji and your damn brother took you into that gate thing. It was like there was light and then…" His brow furrows. "Then there wasn't you."

Her lips part. "Ichigo…"

"Do you want me to tell you this or not?" he snaps, and she falls silent. "Yeah, that's what I thought." Contemplating, he continues slowly. "So I trained, and I went, and then I trained some more. Because I..." He pauses when Rukia lifts her hand (at last, she's finally quit it with the trembling) and runs the smooth little palm against his temple. For a second, he just remains motionless and _feels _her, taking the time to remember that no matter what is happening today, she's safe and _alive _and here with him. And then he takes her hand and pulls it away or else she'll distract him into forgetting what he wants to say.

"I had to see you like that," he murmurs, absently running a couple fingers through her raven hair. "A prisoner because you helped me and saved my family. Because you _made _me." And the images return.

_Rukia clad in a dusty white rag that shocks against her dark hair. The red collar that circles her throat and marks her fate. The enormous flames that lick her flesh and threaten her life. And if it is to be that she is executed, he knows he'll die too. Right here in this place of gods and death and everything in between._

He knows instantly. It's time to tell her, for better or worse. Whether she throws him into light or keeps him locked in the shadows, Ichigo is sure that it will be better than keeping this kind of torturous secret inside.

Rolling off of her, he arranges himself on his side and pulls her back against his chest. Rukia at first tries to turn so she can look at him, but he holds her firmly and she eventually settles down. "My father told me," he says softly as the past glazes his eyes, "that being with someone your whole life is like risking your whole life. I didn't think I'd ever do that. When he – when we – lost Mom, it was awhile before he smiled again, the way he does now. I think a part of Pops might've died with her." Something clenches his heart, that familiar combination of anger and guilt, but then Rukia's hand is on his arm and it goes away. "And after I came back from Soul Society, I somehow got it…that I _had _risked my whole life – for you."

This time when Rukia tries to look at him she is successful and twists in his arms to meet his gaze. "Ichigo, you—"

"I love you." And there it is, just that simply. Except that it isn't simple, and Ichigo feels like his skin is made of dynamite. The air surrounding him feels explosive. Lighting strikes outside again, and the streetlamp shivers. When the dim, poor light returns, Ichigo can plainly see the surprise on Rukia's face. His brain struggles to backpedal, and he fumbles for words. "And I—I just think—"

He gets cut off by Rukia's lips against his own, and his eyes slide shut without any coaxing. Without breaking the kiss, Rukia climbs atop him and he rises up to get closer to her. A faint moan emanates from her throat and rumbles in his, making him dizzy with inner fire.

When she finally tears herself away from him, Ichigo feels mindless, but he soon jumps back to alertness when he sees just how she is smiling at him. "What?" he asks, his voice somewhat hoarse with lingering arousal.

Rukia's face is all shadows and dark angles in the night, but he still makes out the pleased glimmer in her eyes. "Well," she says, "to begin with, you could have just _told _me that instead of making me wait for you to pin me to the floor."

He blinks, in awe of her sudden amusement. Then, before he can spend too much time to figure her out (and Ichigo had thought that he _understood _her), he grabs her by the waist and hauls her up.

"What are you doing?" she demands, her voice pitched higher with shock at the way he carries her – one hand behind her shoulder blades, the other behind her knees.

Ichigo grins as he eye lands on his target. "It's late," he replies cryptically. "We're going to bed." Her hand tightens against him, but he can hear the way she chuckles against his neck.

It isn't simple, confessing something like that. It's damned scary, he knows. It's even scarier waiting for the other person to say the same thing to you.

But, Ichigo decides as he deposits her on the bed – this time without treating her like she's made of glass – even though she hasn't said it yet, he's sure she'll have said it by the time this night is through.

And then they both will feel it without the secrets to keep them shaded from each other.

**The End**


End file.
